Poise your mind with curiosity and openness, asking open questions, as this protects your mind from the limitations of belief and doubt, allowing for a more intelligent and flexible response to reality.
Learn to bear witness to both your own pain and beauty, relaxing around your experience without grasping or rejecting, as this is essential for true happiness and a full, nuanced understanding of life.
Shift your focus from abstract ‘maps’ (grand ideas, concrete thinking, fixed plans) to the ’territory’ (the actual, nuanced, changing lived experience) to discover surprises, beauty, and difficulties in the present moment.
Prioritize creating well-being for yourself by working with your mind, fears, and uncertainty, as this prevents trauma and enables you to respond to others and the world with intelligence, creativity, and compassion.
Let go of strong preferences for how life should be, as they can obstruct your ability to see things as they truly are and prevent life from revealing itself to you.
When anger or reactivity arises and you cannot relax with it, practice ‘being like a log’ – refrain from acting, stay like a piece of wood, and do nothing to avoid negative consequences.
Ask yourself, ‘How can I serve? What can I do to make things move in a better direction?’ to influence positive change and leverage your agency in the world.
Avoid isolating yourself from the suffering of the world, and allow heartbreak to foster connection, as this is crucial for empathy, tenderness, and awakening.
When encountering irritating behavior, humanize the person by thinking of them as someone’s mother or son, which can help you respond with less reactivity and more understanding.
Express warmth and tenderness towards others through simple acts, as this exchange allows you to feel the warmth of your own mind and provides sustained well-being.
If you wish to be selfish, do so intelligently by practicing kindness, as your actions and intentions must align for your own happiness and well-being.
If you have the agency to change something, change it; otherwise, let it be and work only on what you can fix, avoiding fixation on things you have no control over.
Be very careful and observant of your actions, recognizing that everything you do has an effect, impact, and influence on the interdependent world.
Develop patience and tolerance, which are essential skills for bearing adversity, complexity, and beauty in life.
View difficult situations as a playful exchange, and skillfully assess whether to finesse, engage, disengage, or walk away, using creativity to navigate them.
When encountering beauty, resist the impulse to capture it (like taking a photo) or flee from it, and instead try to just stay open and present with the mysterious and interesting experience.
Limit watching too much news to prevent reifying or concretizing your experience, which can lead to fear by looking at everything through a concrete lens instead of a nuanced one.